With every year that passes, I get further away from my target audience, and while I've been happy to think of myself as a father figure to these kids, I'd be a little distressed to be thought of as a grandfather figure.

A children's author on a soapbox is not a pleasant sight but I have become drawn into issues, slightly unwillingly, relating to young people, literacy and youth justice: just look at the number of young people we have locked up in prison, and the uselessness of it.

I'm not a huge fan of prequels and sequels and the cynical rush to make money on the back of books by other writers who are now dead.

As a children's author, reviewers are generally very nice to you. I only ever wrote one adult book and received such a kicking for it that I was in trauma for the next six months.

It's one-of-a-kind, because some people would die to have the family I do.

No one really wants to admit they are lonely, and it is never really addressed very much between friends and family. But I have felt lonely many times in my life.

A mortal parent may appreciate, in some small way, the feelings of a loving Heavenly Father. When our children come to the age when they must leave our direct care, we feel anxiety for their safety and concern that those who are to help them will not fail them.

The compelled mother loves her child as the caged bird sings. The song does not justify the cage nor the love the enforcement.